Don't You Understand? Can't You See?
by Fiction C9
Summary: What is the only way to grant the thing you know your best friend has always always wanted, but you are in the way? NatsumexRuka friendship fic.


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Disclaimer: I don't own Gakuen Alice or even 'Living on A Faraway Planet' - Guang Liang and 'Iris'-Goo Goo Dolls, the songs that inspired this one-shot. A tip: please listen to 'Iris' while reading. It fits the mood of the story, at least it does for me. Listening to the other song would work too.

_Let me help you. Let me be the protector for once in our friendship._

A young boy, blond hair flopping messily over his forehead, crouches down next his friend. His best friend. A friend who is currently hugging his knees to his chest, his face lowered, shrouded in shadows, shoulders shaking, fingers trembling slightly before digging into his flesh, as he struggles to regain control of himself.

To put on the mask again.

_You don't have to hide your pain from me._

The other boy gets to his feet, brushing away the black hair hanging in his eyes. His face in now carefully composed. Blank. Every trace of that vulnerable, scared, hurt twelve-year-old boy that he rarely releases from its prison deep inside the furthest recesses of his heart, removed. Dissipated. Gone.

As if it had never existed.

He impatiently waves away the hand the golden-haired boy stretches out to him.

"I'm fine. Ruka."

He doesn't see the desperate fear in his best friend's sky-blue eyes.

_Don't lie to me. Please don't lie to me._

He's standing in Natsume's room. The lights are off; Natsume always thought light was a waste of time. The black-haired boy is snatching up his cat mask, pushing aside Ruka's arm as he tries to shove past him out of the room.

"Where are you going?"

"You know where."

Natsume pulls back the strap, drawing the mask over his head.

"Don't go! You'll only get-"

He stumbles backwards slightly as Natsume shoves him away. Hard.

"Don't interfere."

He finds himself staring into a pair of crimson blood-red eyes. Eyes without a trace of recognition or friendship or mercy. Eyes that he knows many have seen and quailed in front of, before meeting fiery painful deaths.

His best friend has the eyes of a killer.

The door slams shut, leaving him standing silently in the dark. And tears, silver-pale in the blackness, fall to the ground.

_You destroyed yourself to protect me. Do you think I could take that?_

There is a crash as his head slams into the wall.

He shuts his eyes for a moment, letting the pain wash over him, and then opens them, staring defiantly into those same crimson eyes. Eyes that are now the eyes of a friend, albeit an angry, hurt friend. A friend whose fingers are wrapped around his throat.

"You idiot." Natsume's voice is hoarse, raw. "What were you thinking?"

Ruka doesn't answer, instead concentrating on the pain in the back of his head, in the wounds on his arm, expanding it and expanding it until it engulfs his entire body.

The agony is just another way to avoid seeing that other kind of agony, the one reflected clearly in every line of Natsume's face.

_Did you think I would just stand by, watch you get hurt because of me? I did what I thought was right. _

Natsume holds up the shiny, blood-stained knife. Ruka watches, briefly fascinated by his reflection in the smooth silver surface.

Then there is a clang as the knife lands all the way across the room.

The grip on his throat tightens.

"Why did you do it?"

It is a question that demands an answer, deserves an answer. And so he replies, softly, quietly, on some insane hope that Natsume will not hear.

"If I die, then…then there will be nothing holding you to this place."

_Don't you understand? You will be free._

Natsume's fingers loosen suddenly, and Ruka feels himself slide down the cracked, bloodstained wall, his legs folding beneath him.

There is silence for a while.

And then something totally alien, completely inconceivable pierces the empty air.

Natsume drops to his knees in front of him, his hands covering his face, the tears leaking between his fingers, snaking down his wrists, mingling with the blood. The strangled sobs escaping his lips sound wild, angry, agonized.

"You crazy…" his voice is choked, filled with pain. "Don't you understand?"

His hands drop, revealing a face that is so young and yet so old, so vulnerable and yet so weighed down with the burden of reality. His blood-red eyes are shining with tears yet unshed, but his mouth is set in a firm line.

"This…this _hell _was mychoice. To protect you. To protect me." His voice is barely a whisper. "You had no right to make it for me."

Silence. Only the sound of tears and blood falling to the floor.

"This was always my choice."

_Can't you see? Any freedom without you to share it with would be bittersweet._

**Thanks for reading. Reviews would be appreciated, so long as they're not flames. **


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